Scholars, students and individuals interested in presidential history have even greater access to Theodore Roosevelt's documents and artifacts, thanks to two new initiatives undertaken by the Theodore Roosevelt Center at Dickinson State University.

The Theodore Roosevelt Center is one of six presidential sites participating in a pilot project. This new website, www.presidentialcollections.org, offers a single source for discovering the digital collections of multiple presidential sites and libraries, including the Rutherford B. Hayes Presidential Center, Sixth Floor Museum at Dealey Plaza and the Woodrow Wilson Presidential Library. Funded by the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) and developed by the University of Virginia's Miller Center, the successful beta website demonstrates the power of single-source searching for presidential materials.

Theodore Roosevelt's documents and artifacts are also now available in WorldCat, the world's largest network of library content and services. Using WorldCat's Digital Collections Gateway, the Theodore Roosevelt Center's collections have been made more visible and discoverable by users who search WorldCat's websites, as well as Google, Yahoo! and other popular sites. Ultimately, users will click through to the Theodore Roosevelt Center's site, www.theodorerooseveltcenter.org, to access the digital items. The inclusion in WorldCat maximizes the global visibility of the Center's resources.

"We are delighted with the success of these two initiatives, which make our collections even more accessible to the public," said Sharon Kilzer, project manager of the Theodore Roosevelt Center. "The documents of every president are important historical records, and those of Theodore Roosevelt are inherently interesting. Through these projects, we continue to expand our reach, to serve all those interested in the historical legacy of our 26th president."

The Connecting Presidential Collections website is the culmination of a year-long IMLS grant which included convening a summit meeting with experts in the fields of archives, libraries and digital humanities. Participation in the Digital Collections Gateway was made possible through the development efforts of IDM USA, the Theodore Roosevelt Center's digital publishing partner.